Sweetly Deceiving
by Taliya
Summary: A chronology of instances that detail the evolution—and the destruction thereof—of the relationship between Akai Shuuichi and Furuya Rei. Rated for language and character death. Spoilers for Scarlet arc and beyond. Written for Poirot Café's Prompt Exchange #9.


Detective Conan and Magic Kaito characters, settings, and ideas do not belong to me but to Aoyama Gōshō.

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Warnings: Language, character death, spoilers for all things related to Akai Shuuichi and Furuya Rei

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Sweetly Deceiving

By Taliya

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Prompt: Akai and Amuro eating ice cream

Word Count: 1927

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"Moroboshi."

He turned upon hearing his name, blinking as the tanned blond approached him. "Amuro," he greeted in kind.

"What are you doing here of all places?" Amuro asked, gesturing to expansive streets of Ginza.

"What, am I not allowed to be out and about?" he asked, blinking curiously at his covert colleague, Amuro Touru. His purpose in this busy shopping district had been to buy a toy for his mother's birthday, which was coming up rather soon. Amuro, though, did not need to know that.

Amuro shook his head. "I never said that," he corrected with a crooked grin. "It's just… strange, seeing you here, I guess."

Moroboshi Dai huffed in amusement. "I suppose you're right, considering the circumstances in which we usually see each other." He jerked a thumb at a small ice cream parlor tucked into a small space on a side street off the main thoroughfare. "Want some ice cream?"

The blond blinked in blindsided confusion. "Ice cream…?" he echoed quizzically.

He shook his long mane of straight black hair and chuckled. "You know, cold, sweet dessert that melts very fa—"

"I _know_ what ice cream is," Amuro snapped testily, cutting off his teasing. "What about it?"

"Want some? It's hot out, and I'm buying," he replied, jabbing a finger at the warm summer sun above.

Amuro considered for a moment before reluctantly grinning and relenting with a, "Only since you're paying."

Moroboshi strolled ahead without waiting. "No need to be jerk about accepting," he chided, tossing a smirk over his shoulder.

The rather incongruous pair strolled into a cramped but cheerily decorated shop; the interior contained a display containing the various flavors of the day, along with additional mix-ins and toppings. Moroboshi ordered black sesame, while Amuro ordered squid ink. The two desserts came beautifully swirled in waffle cones, both a dark grey that in color. The black-haired man paid for the cones, and after receiving his from his waiting colleague, stepped back out into the hot June afternoon heat.

"Anything lined up so far?" Moroboshi idly asked as he lapped at the circumference of the ice cream, thereby destroying the undulating decorative exterior.

Amuro shrugged. "I'm new; I'm still 'in training,' so to speak," he replied casually.

Moroboshi snorted. "I wasn't there too long ago myself."

"Well, I'm off to Hibiya Station," the blond said as they stopped at a streetlight behind a throng of waiting people. "Thanks. For this," he said, lifting the partially eaten cone in emphasis.

"No problem," he said. "I'm off to Yuurakuchou Station myself." He turned on the balls of his feet and moved away, not needing to wait for the crosswalk light. "Be careful out there," he called out over his shoulder.

He heard Amuro's, "Back at you," and frowned, wondering if he could trust the man in the way that only assassins could—a twist in his way of thinking, considering he was training to become one of them.

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"I suppose congratulations are in order."

Moroboshi paused, swiveling to find Amuro smirking at him. He huffed, turning completely to face the blond. "I honestly was not expecting it—at least, not so soon."

Amuro shrugged eyes glinting shrewdly. "But you were still good enough to catch Ano Kata's eye, _Rye_."

His new name still sent shivers of dread down his spine, considering what he had done to earn it. Moroboshi violently squelched the desire to scream, instead pasting on a grin that he hoped was not too sickly as he reminded himself that his role was all part of the plan to infiltrate and take down the Organization. He could not forget that important fact.

"And you're equally as good," he answered with frank honesty, "I'd be surprised if you weren't promoted yourself sometime soon."

The blond chuckled darkly, and buried somewhere, faintly, within that laughter was an edge of hysteria. "Soon, huh?"

Moroboshi decided not to call him out on it. He already harbored a few suspicions about his fellow assassin—ones that assuredly would get him killed if he leaked them to the wrong ears. But Moroboshi's desire, his goal, was not about killing people; he was about _saving_ them. And if he could shelter one more life for a little longer in this perilous dance that passed for his occupation, then so be it.

"You already have Ano Kata's number; it's only a matter of time at this point," he pointed out, "as they are aware of who you are and what you are capable of."

"That's… true," Amuro conceded. He smirked self-deprecatingly. "I guess I still have some catching up to do before I'm equal to you in their eyes."

The black-haired man glanced away, hiding his expression of heartache over what seemed to be a newly created rivalry that would be measured by body count. "Indeed."

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"Yo, Rye."

A glance up revealed a familiar blond, and he smirked. "Congratulations, _Bourbon_ ," he greeted from where he leaned against the wall of a warehouse, a half burnt cigarette resting easily between two fingers.

Amuro snorted, pride turning his grin more boyish and youthful for a fleeting moment. "Fancy meeting you here."

Moroboshi snorted this time, taking a long drag of his cigarette. "We were _assigned_ together, or have you forgotten so quickly?"

"I haven't," Amuro answered, coming to a stop beside him, though he avoided the exhaled cloud of smoke. "Decided which one you're going after?"

"Depends," he rumbled as he contemplatively stared at the glowing orange end of his cigarette. "What are your strengths?"

The blond answered promptly. "Close combat, for the most part, though I'm not a bad shot."

"Same," Moroboshi responded. He thought for a moment, sending a short prayer of forgiveness for the two lives they were to snuff out this night before he said, "Eliminate Eguchi. I'll take care of Sugimoto. Choose whatever method you deem most efficient; no evidence or witnesses."

Amuro nodded, his mien serious. "Meet you back here in an hour?"

He nodded. "One hour." He twisted away from the wall, taking one last inhale before flicking the stub onto the concrete before tugging on gloves. He pulled out his Glock, screwing a silencer onto the barrel. The distant echo of the ratchet of a gun chambering a round echoed in the empty warehouse district, and Moroboshi sighed deeply one time before suppressing his emotions. He had a job to do, and it needed to be done well for him to continue this game of life and death.

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A gasp.

He spun, catching sight of Amuro standing, agape, at the sight before him. Internally he winced, for Moroboshi knew just how bad the situation looked: a named agent dead at his feet and a smoking gun in his hand. "I—"

 _"_ _YOU BASTARD!"_ Amuro shrieked, charging at him with seeming mindless fury.

He barely had time to brace himself for impact, the blond too close to have successfully dodged. The two of them were sent sprawling across the concrete from the blond's momentum, the wind knocked out of him. But he swiftly retained his senses, shoving the enraged Amuro away to gain some distance as he rolled back onto his feet. "Amu—"

But he was cut off as Amuro lunged forwards, bringing with him powerful, lightning-quick punches and jabs that the black-haired man was hard pressed to deflect. It seemed there would be no reasoning with the man; with Amuro lost within this blind maelstrom of fury, there would be no way to communicate the fact that he now knew with absolute certainty that the blond was a triple agent—like Scotch had been. The subtle hints of familiarity between the two whenever the two interacted, despite how few and far in between they had been, had been enough to clue him in to a camaraderie beyond that of simply agents of the Organization.

He had not meant to walk in on Scotch making a call reporting in to his handler; Moroboshi knew full well the risk of being caught with ever phone call to James Black that he made. It had actually been a relief to discover that he was not the only sleeper agent within the Organization. But Scotch had panicked, and in his alarm he had offed himself despite Moroboshi's frantic assurances that they were, in fact, working on the same side.

So here he was, down an ally that he had never known he had had, and fighting a grief-stricken Public Security Bureau agent who had been close to the recently dead agent. Amuro landed a blow to his shoulder, and Moroboshi staggered back. The blond followed, intending on using the black-haired man's retreat to press his own attack.

Moroboshi instead parried, twisting around the surprised blond and locking him in a chokehold. Amuro's struggles grew weaker from the suffocating hold Moroboshi had on him, and only after he was sure Amuro was completely unconscious did Moroboshi release him, carefully lying him on the ground as Amuro coughed, but failed to awaken.

He exhaled exhaustedly, glancing over at Scotch with regret. His eyes fell on the blond, and as he rose to his feet, he murmured with heartfelt remorse, "I'm sorry," before walking away.

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"Okiya-san!"

"Hello, Amuro-san." Okiya Subaru smiled back at the cheerful greeting from the blond barista, Amuro Touru. It had been two weeks since the blond had appeared on the doorstep of his rented home with an air of barely-leashed hatred. It had turned out that Amuro's perceived grievances had involved a mistaken identity on his part, and the barista had left rather quickly and apologetically.

Today he had felt like taking a breather from his studies, and had wandered into Café Poirot for a snack. Okiya settled himself in a booth, ordering two cones of mango ice cream, much to Amuro's puzzlement. Still the blond obliged, bearing two waffle cones full of the bright yellow dessert.

Okiya took one and nibbled the edge of the cone. "Sit," he instructed, gesturing to the empty seat across from him. "I bought that cone for you."

"I—what?" the blond stuttered, blinking in confusion at the remaining cone in his hand.

The pink-haired man chuckled. "You seemed stressed out these last couple of weeks," he remarked. "So… my treat."

Amuro slowly sank into the chair, stunned. "I… thank you," he murmured as he tentatively lipped the ice cream.

Okiya gave the ice cream a swipe with his tongue. "You looked like you needed a break—so I figured, why not?"

"Do I really look that bad?" the blond complained good-naturedly as he licked a mouthful of the mango-flavored confection.

"A bit tired," he replied with honestly. "And also, it's a show of good will. I don't bear any grudge against you for what happened two weeks ago."

Amuro flushed. "Ah, that. I _am_ sorry," he said penitently, hunching in on himself in embarrassment.

Okiya shook his head. "It's hard to let go of past grudges, sometimes," he said softly, knowingly, and Amuro nodded glumly in agreement.

"Yeah," he sighed.

The two of them continued to eat their cones in silence, the crunch of their waffle cones notwithstanding. Okiya finished his cone first, placing the correct amount of bills and change on the table. "The human capacity for forgiveness is truly a wondrous thing," he remarked with a sad smile as he stood and made his way towards the door. He thought of Miyano Akemi and her bright, beautiful smile, and his heart ached in longing and loss. "Don't ever forget that, Amuro-san."

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Author's Note: So I didn't really have a concrete story when I thought up how I wanted to write this, and this is the result: a series of snippets that start and end with ice cream. I had debated whether or not I wanted Furuya, as a native Japanese, to go for something a little more… inclined to the Japanese palette—say, octopus, or chicken wing, or whitebait (immature fish fry). Also, I've shuffled up the timeline a little to where both were promoted to named agents before Scotch's death, thus giving me a little leeway to play with them as they bantered about their statuses within the Organization. I know this is not my best work, but lately I've been in a rut and thus having a hard time getting myself to get anything out on paper. I sincerely hope this isn't entirely rubbish, half-baked as it is. To whoever it was I wrote this for, I hope you enjoyed it.

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Completed: 22.05.2017


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